


Don't Fear the Reaping

by leftofrevolution



Series: Hybridization [3]
Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Depression, F/F, Imprisonment, Ridiculous
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-28
Updated: 2016-01-17
Packaged: 2018-03-26 04:13:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3836620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leftofrevolution/pseuds/leftofrevolution
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Excerpts of Hybridization-verse after 'Twelve Years Until the Harvest.'</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Kya and Ghazan, just prior to Republic City

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes friendships end not with a bang, nor a whimper; sometimes nothing is said at all.

“So I hear you’re leaving tomorrow.”

“First ship headed to Republic City in the morning,” Ghazan agreed, and scooted over on the blanket to make room for Kya, who immediately availed herself of the extra space to simultaneously both gracelessly sprawl back on her elbows and shove an open bottle of shochu in Ghazan’s face. He managed to grab it before it either spilled or hit him in the nose, which spoke less to his dexterity and more to Kya’s relative sobriety.

 _She must have waited for me for once before getting started_ , and the fact that her bottle was still topped off and the lack of the stench of alcohol on her breath bore this out. She still hadn’t looked at him yet, so it fell to him to make sure their bottles connected properly in the traditional _clink_ before he took his first swig. It was about as nasty as ever, but then, the good stuff never seemed to make it this far south, and by this point he had learned to conceal his grimace.

Kya gulped down what had to be at least three shots’ worth of her own bottle before planting it before her in the snow and wiping her mouth clean with her sleeve. “You’re going to miss the shit out of me in the city,” she stated, matter-of-fact. Ghazan glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, but she still wasn’t looking at him, her gaze somewhere out to sea.

“I don’t know about that,” he said, careful to sound as careless as ever. “It’ll be kind of nice to be able to buy my own booze again, and it can’t be half as bad as this shit.”

She smirked. “Yeah, but who’ll you drink it with? For a bunch of revolutionaries, your friends are a tightly-wound bunch.”

“P’Li’ll probably loosen up enough once we’re away from here to start drinking again.” Twelve years was a long time to stay paranoid, but somehow P’Li had managed it. She was long-since due to get completely wasted. “And someone has to hold Korra’s hair back the first time she realizes she can finally do whatever the hell she wants and goes totally overboard.”

Kya didn’t look convinced. “That sounds a lot more like babysitting than having a good time.”

Ghazan shrugged. “So maybe I’ll miss you a little. But it’s not like I’ll never see you again. You have to visit your little brother at some point, right?”

Kya looked even less convinced of this than she had of P’Li or Korra’s suitability as drinking partners. “And the last time you saw your sister was… when, exactly?”

“I didn’t have much of a choice for the past twelve years,” Ghazan defended himself, but he relented the point; it hadn’t even occurred to him to make plans to go see Yan even after (or maybe it was due to) nearly two decades apart, and Omashu was more or less on the way to Republic City. Kya, in contrast, had seen Tenzin just yesterday, even if he’d stuck around for less than a day, and by all accounts their relationship was more complicated than his and Yan’s had ever been. “You could just come see me and tell your mom you’re going to see Tenzin,” he suggested. “I’ll probably know a few good tourist spots by the time you’re willing to bother. I could show you around.”

Kya waved a hand airily, instantly dismissing the idea. “I don’t like to force relationships that way. If we see each other again, if we don’t see each other again… so be it.”

 _Friendship doesn’t work that way_ , Ghazan nearly said, but didn’t. He had learned a long time ago that as far as he was concerned, Kya was, as Zaheer had once put it, ‘a calm pond’: you could drop as many rocks in it as you wanted, and the ripples looked dramatic, but after a few seconds it always became pretty clear that the effort had changed absolutely nothing.

Which was one of many, many reasons he hadn’t been in the least tempted to stay; everyone and everything he had left a noticeable impression on at the South Pole was coming with him to Republic City. As far as who remained were concerned, he might never have existed at all.

It was only because he was stupid that sometimes that fact hurt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Someone asked for a Ghazan friendship story in Hybridization-verse. Ghazan is bad at being the more invested, less cynical one in a friendship, which fortunately for him isn't a situation that comes about very often but isn't terribly pleasant when it does.


	2. Korra and Zaheer, post-Amon first encounter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Korra deals with the fallout of her first encounter with Amon; Zaheer attempts to help.

“I know, I _know_ I should have listened to you and Tenzin. That I shouldn’t have joined Councilman Tarrlok’s task force. That not only would it associate me with a guy with shitty policies, but I would be throwing myself up against Amon and his followers without any real idea of what I was facing. I know now, okay? You were right, and I’m… I’m just a stupid child.”

Zaheer blinked down at Korra. “I haven’t said anything yet.”

Korra just laughed, the sound having a distinct bite to it, one knee pulled up to her chest while her other leg dangled off the side of the cliff, her hands gripping her knee tightly, probably because if they weren’t they’d be shaking. She still hadn’t changed out of her task force uniform, and even from several feet away, he could smell the lingering sourness of where she had sweated through the cotton. She was shivering slightly, and it wasn’t cold out enough for that.

Still in shock, then. Not that he could blame her. 

“I still know what you’re going to say.” It felt wrong, to hear Korra so soft-spoken, so hopeless. “I’ve already heard it like five times tonight.”

He made sure to move entirely into her line of sight before he–slowly, deliberately, with no sudden movements that might startle her–dropped to sit down beside her, crossing his legs habitually at the ankle. “I doubt anyone has called you a stupid child.”

“They were thinking it.”

“I doubt that as well.”

Another laugh, this one edging towards hysterical before Korra abruptly cut herself off, pulling her other leg up to her chest and wrapping her arms around herself. She didn’t say anything for a while, and seemed to be waiting for something, but he was perfectly content to less the silence hang. It was a nice evening, despite everything. Clear skies, warm breeze. He wasn’t yet over the novelty of being able to sit outside for more than thirty seconds without at least three layers, and despite what Korra thought, he hadn’t actually come prepared with a speech.

It was a good five minutes before Korra spoke again. “I was so scared.” He glanced at her, out of the corner of his eye, but she was still resolutely not looking at him, her eyes focused somewhere towards Republic City. “I- the raids were going so well. I thought we’d have this taken care of in a month. But then it looked like a couple of them were going to get away, and there was no one else around  to pursue, so I ran off after them. I had beat down two chi-blockers alone before. I was sure I had it handled. And then-” She shuddered again, harder this time. 

He would have offered her his jacket, had his brought one, but, well, nice weather. He didn’t even have gloves on. He was regretting that now.

It didn’t take more than a few seconds before Korra gathered herself and continued, her voice nearly inaudible, “I was pulled into a side alley before I even knew something was happening. Amon’s followers had me immobilized within seconds. I couldn’t do a thing.” A sniffle, and he was sure that if he looked at her then, he would see her eyes darting towards him, gauging his reaction, so he did her the courtesy of not having one, keeping his own gaze focused on the pro-bending arena in the distance, his expression serene. After a moment, she continued, sounding even more miserable than before, “All that effort you guys put into training me, and I froze. I told myself afterwards that there was no water close enough, that there wasn’t time to get into the mindset to combustion bend, that I’d need at least my hands free before I could lavabend the street, but the truth is that I’m just a shitty Avatar. None of that would have stopped Master Katara, or Ming-Hua, or P’Li, or Ghazan, if any of them were even stupid enough to get themselves in that situation to begin with.

“So I froze, and there was Amon. And he looked down at me, and he grabbed me by the chin, and all I could think about was the way he’d taken away people’s bending at that rally, and I thought that was it for me, but he didn’t do it. He just said,” and here Korra dropped her voice a few octaves, though it still sounded nothing like what Zaheer had heard of Amon, “‘You shouldn’t have lauded your victories over our movement so loudly, young Avatar. You should know better than to think that even you are immune to our righteous cause.

“However, although it would be the simplest thing for me to take away your bending at this very moment, I won’t. You’d only become a martyr. Benders of every nation would rally behind your defeat if I stripped you of your power here and now, but I assure you, I have a plan. And I’m saving you for last, and I will destroy you.’ And then,” Korra said, her voice dropping again to a whisper, “He just… left.

“First time I faced down that asshole, and he didn’t even need to take my bending to beat me.” She sounded bitter, the self-recrimination practically bleeding from her tone. Even worse than he’d expected, from what he’d heard had happened. Broken.

He let his left hand–the one out of Korra’s line of sight–curl itself into a fist, his nails biting into his palm, even as he kept his face and voice placid as he said, “I wonder how often he practiced that sermon in front of a mirror.”

Now he could _feel_ Korra’s gaze on him, disbelieving. The laugh that followed was equally so. “… What?”

“That monologue he gave you,” he clarified, finally turning to look at her. She looked startled, her lip quirked and her eyes wide as if she wasn’t quite sure she had heard him correctly, but at least that feeling of fragility around her had faded. “No one speaks like that unpracticed. You remember our speech lessons; how often would you have to recite that little diatribe before you could get it out without laughing, or stuttering? How many times did you go over it in your head before you were able to say it to me now?”

“… Dozens.”

He nodded thoughtfully, as if he had expected that response. “He knew you were coming. Somehow word got out about the raid. He expected you, and he lured you into a trap.

“Everyone is vulnerable when they’re caught off-guard, Korra. Even the Avatar.”

“But I shouldn’t have been. I should have-”

“Not gone off on your own. Never allowed all those interviews about your successes. Never gone on the raids to begin with. Concentrated more on the underlying social and political issues that allowed the Equalist movement to gain such momentum in the first place. Remembered to give us tickets to your last pro-bending match. Never given Bolin our phone number-”

“Okay, you can stop now,” Korra grumbled, but she couldn’t quite hide the smirk teasing at the corner of her mouth, the way her shoulders had lowered slightly from their former position somewhere around her ears.

He was a little proud of himself, despite everything. He could never claim Ghazan or Ming-Hua’s wit, but there was something to be said for making the best use of one’s natural deadpan “He calls every day. He once kept Ghazan on the phone for three and a half hours. I still don’t understand why he doesn’t just visit in person.”

“P’Li scares him.” He looked at her. “… and Ming-Hua. And you, a little bit. I think he finds the phone less intimidating than the idea of running into one of-” She shook her head abruptly, as if to clear it. “Now you’re just trying to distract me.”

He shrugged. “You seemed to desire chastisement.”

“I fucked up.”

“Slightly. And frequently. You’re seventeen.” She frowned at him again, so he continued more seriously, “But that isn’t what bothers you.”

She looked almost as if she was going to deny it, before her shoulders slumped. “He could have done it. Taken my bending. I couldn’t have stopped him.”

“Yes,” he agreed. “That is true.”

“Everyone else says they won’t let it happen,” she said somewhere in the direction of her knees.

By ‘everyone else,’ he could only imagine she meant Tenzin and her pro-bending teammates, with perhaps the Councilman and the Police Chief if they were feeling particularly roused by Amon’s latest display of disregard for their vaunted rules and laws. It wouldn’t occur to Ming-Hua to say something so patently untrue, and P’Li and Ghazan might be tempted, but they knew the damage that could be wrought by even well-meaning lies. He was fairly sure they hadn’t had the chance to talk to Korra yet, anyway. “Everyone can’t be around you all the time, Korra.”

“So what you’re saying is that one day Amon’s gonna grab me again and use his spirit mojo to take my bending away forever, and I can’t do anything about it.” And there it was again, the brokenness back in her voice, in the way she held herself.

He nearly sighed. He nearly wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her against his side, the way he had done once before, so long ago when she needed more than anything else to not feel alone.

He often nearly did a lot of things, most of them ill-advised. Loneliness was not her problem now. And while he had some private doubts about Amon’s ‘spirit mojo,’ if not about the abilities he’d purportedly been granted in of themselves, learning about those doubts wasn’t something she needed at the moment either. “What I’m saying is that is a realistic, worse-case scenario.”

Her fists clenched around her knees. He didn’t need to see her face to hear the tears in her voice as she hissed, “I have a crazy megalomaniac after me. Couldn’t you be upset for me, for once?”

He didn’t respond in kind. She already had too many mentors who were willing to humor her with her displays of temper. “You don’t understand what I’m saying. Do you know why Amon wants to take your bending?”

“… ‘cause I’m a threat.”

“Yes, but not for the reasons you’re thinking. Your personal power means nothing to him. If it did, he would have taken your bending tonight.” He looked her in the eye now. And despite her tears, her gaze was focused. She was listening, in a way she hadn’t been before. “You’re a symbol. One he wants to tear down, publicly, because in doing so he thinks he can break the spirit of everyone who would oppose him.

“There is a very simple way to thwart men like Amon, Korra.” Iconoclasts, but of the worst kind. Leaders who built movements to support themselves, instead of using themselves to support the movement. No one who actually valued equality would have put himself so much in the limelight, to the point of plastering his visage across every poster and pamphlet. It made Zaheer want to spit, to see a crusade with so much justifiable anger subverted to stroke one man’s ego.

Also, Amon’s speeches at the rallies were so full of showboating that Zaheer had considered tracking down the man in charge of the lighting and kidnapping him to assist Korra’s attempts at public speaking. Despite his best efforts, they weren’t her strongest point; spirits knew she could use the help. “Every action they take is one they want to impart meaning on the world. Their actions are a means to an end. Taking your bending is a means. His end is to break you.

“If you don’t break, he cannot win.”

He actually felt it when Korra’s fist slammed into the ground, mostly because it actually caused the cliff to tremble slightly. Well. It wasn’t as if he wouldn’t survive the fall into the ocean, though he wouldn’t be happy about it. There were more than a few rocks at the bottom, this close to shore. “You don’t get it! You’re not a bender, much less the Avatar. If he takes my bending, I’m nothing!”

He couldn’t keep an edge from creeping into his voice as he replied, “Have you listened to nothing I’ve taught you? What do you think the Avatar is?”

“… Master of all four elements.”

He shook his head, making sure to keep her gaze. “No; you know better than that. That’s what the Avatar is _known_ for on this side, something human eyes can see. Now tell me again: what is the Avatar?”

“The host of Raava, the spirit of order and light.” Her voice was stronger now. “The bridge between the human world and the spirit world."

He nodded. “Exactly. And unless Amon managed to free and host Vaatu within himself over a year before the beginning of Harmonic Convergence, I don’t care what spirits he has rallied to his cause: That is something Amon can never take from you. Mastery of all four elements is a _tool_ ; it isn’t what makes you the Avatar. That mastery meant nothing when Roku chose a friendship long dead over his duty, when Kyoshi decided she would rather see stability than justice, when Kuruk let his arrogance blind him to his responsibilities to the Spirit World. The ability to bend the elements doesn’t make you a good Avatar; it’s just one more way to impose your will upon the world, and often not the best one. Even if Amon stripped you of your bending tomorrow, you would be no less than you are right now. And what you are now is a young woman who has the potential within her to be the greatest Avatar either world has ever seen.”

There was a long moment of silence. Even the wind itself seemed to hold its breath, the universe pausing in recognition of this ripple in the path of fate. Korra had possessed confidence in her bending prowess over herself for too long; it was something Zaheer had long sought to rectify, but thus far in vain. Perhaps it was only now, when she recognized the possibility of losing the barometer by which she had measured her worth, that that could change.

“… Even better than Yangchen?”

“… The second greatest Avatar either world has ever seen.”

If her nudge at his shoulder was more of a lean than the usual shove, if her laugh a little more watery than her usual undignified snort… he could live with that, to hear, to see, to _know_ , that she was no longer shaking, that the confidence was back in her eyes; that at least for a time, the foundations of her existence would feel stable under her feet.

He could not guarantee her safety. Nor could he promise her wealth, or recognition, or any support beyond his own. In the grand scheme of things, he had very little power over anything that mattered. But he could have faith in her, Korra; and because she trusted him, respected him, despite everything… she was, if slowly, learning to have faith in herself.

And once she had that… he _dared_ Amon to try and break the woman Korra would become.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Someone asked for a Zaheer hurt/comfort story in Hybridization-verse. It's always somewhat difficult to figure out where to draw the line in a canon divergence between OOC and an acknowledgement that things went differently, especially when what went differently is a major enough event to have played a large part in how some of the characters became who they were in canon.


	3. Asami and P'Li, Republic City party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which P’Li tries to give Asami relationship advice and is terrible at it, but that doesn’t mean the advice itself isn’t good.

“Why are you with that boy?”

Asami’s glass of sake stopped halfway to her lips as she tried to think of a politic response to this. She had met Korra’s firebending teacher a few times before, but it had always been in passing, or at parties like this one. They certainly weren’t familiar enough for P’Li to be asking her personal questions out of the blue. “… Are you talking about Mako?”

P’Li nodded, her gaze never leaving the table of appetizers where Mako was awkwardly trying to maneuver his way past the crowd to the sashimi.

When P’Li didn’t elaborate, Asami was tempted to just walk away in pursuit of the same spirit of incivility, but Korra spoke of her firebending teacher very fondly, and Asami didn’t want to do anything to alienate one of the people Korra loved and respected. “… He’s handsome. And polite. And charming when he’s not trying. And driven in a way I understand.”

“So you don’t love him.”

“We’ve only been dating a few weeks.” More silence from P’Li. Asami was beginning to feel a bit uncomfortable. This usually took more effort than a few curt sentences, but though her etiquette tutors had been pretty good, they hadn’t quite equipped her for towering, tattooed specters. “We fit well together.”

At that, P’Li shook her head. It almost looked mocking, if it weren’t for the narrowing of her eyes as she watched Mako being waylaid by yet another pro-bending fan. “You fit.” She did not sound impressed.

Asami by that point had gone straight past uncomfortable and was just deciding whether it was worth getting angry at a woman whose good opinion she was no longer sure she even wanted. “We get along well enough. We have fun. And I don’t think it’s any of your business whom I’m involved with.”

For the first time since P’Li had started talking to her, the taller woman actually looked her in the eye. “You are wasting your time spending it with a placeholder. As you are his in turn. Be careful to not find yourself one day the one left behind when he finally decides he wants better than ‘well enough.’”

All right, angry it was. “Watch your next words very carefully.”

Asami expected P’Li to be even less impressed with the implied threat than she had been of Asami’s explanation of her relationship with Mako, but instead her eyes softened. She almost looked sad. “You care for him; that is fair. I am not saying there is nothing of the boy to be loved. But what matters is not whether he is worthy of you, or you of him. What matters is whether his _love_ is worthy of yours, meets it, grows alongside it… or whether it flinches away.” Her gaze turned back towards Mako, who had not yet managed to escape the pro-bending fan and was staring fixedly at the gallery’s entrance like it held the keys to his freedom. “Never be with anyone whose eyes aren’t drawn to you. Especially when they’re drawn to another.

“If he doesn’t seek your light, he isn’t worthy of its warmth.”

It was a saccharine, overwrought twist on an ancient Fire Nation proverb, but Asami barely registered it, because as she watched Mako’s eyes track a line across the room, she realized he hadn’t been looking at the entrance at all, but instead who had just walked through it.

 _Korra really does look pretty in that dress_ , she thought, and didn’t even notice as P’Li slipped away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Requested indirectly by avatar-dacia, in terms of showing P'Li in a mentoring role to Asami. This is P'Li trying to be more subtle. She really wants to shake Asami by the shoulders and shout, "NEVER DATE ANYONE WHO DOESN'T LOOK AT YOU LIKE YOU ARE THE SUN AND HE DREAMS OF BEING STRUCK BLIND BY YOUR LIGHT. LIKE YOU ARE THE MOON AND HE IS THE SEA. LIKE YOU ARE A MOUNTAIN AND HE JUST BOUGHT CLIMBING-" And then Zaheer shows up to the party late and drags P'Li away while apologizing sincerely to Asami, which only works because P'Li wasn't entire sure how she was going to finish that last simile and was glad to be given the chance to escape.


	4. The Red Lotus and Korra, post-Harmonic Convergence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Four times the Red Lotus helped the Avatar woo the woman of her dreams. Probably. Define helping.

_P’Li_

“P’Li? How did you and Zaheer first get together?”

P’Li didn’t even bother pausing in her organization of her half of the Pai Sho tiles when she replied, “He told me he loved me.”

Korra looked kind of disappointed. “That’s it?”

“We kissed afterwards, if that’s what you mean.”

“Not _that_ , just… no grand gesture? No buildup? No…” Korra made a vague waving gesture with her hand, “… Wooing, or whatever?”

P’Li thought about it. “There was about a year of mutual pining first. I don’t recommend it.”

“… So no wooing.”

“He helped get me out from under the thumb of a warlord, taught me how to read, write, and figure, and introduced me to a political movement that gave my life a greater purpose. Define ‘wooing.’“

“… I think I’m going to have to aim a little lower than that with Asami.”

 

_Ghazan_

“I could tell her for you.”

Korra glanced up from her lunch, still chewing on her seaweed noodles. “What?”

“I could tell Asami you’re into her.”

Korra choked on her noodles. It was nearly the most ignominious end for the Avatar since Wan’s bonding with Raava 20,000 years before, but fortunately Ghazan hadn’t been _trying_ to kill the Avatar just then, so the next thirty seconds were spent with Ghazan slapping Korra between the shoulder blades while she tried to figure out how to breathe through inhaled seaweed. As soon as Korra managed to clear her windpipe (or possibly slightly before, since she was still coughing), she stuck a warning finger right under Ghazan’s nose. “ _No_.”

Ghazan did not seem particularly fazed. “Why not? You won’t.”

“I’m working on it!”

Ghazan raised an eyebrow. “For the past three _months_?”

”Work in progress! We go driving every day now. Yesterday we stopped at a taiyaki stand for snacks afterwards. We’re getting there!”

“Like a stream wears down a mountain.”

Korra nodded sagely at the simile. “Exactly.”

”So… we’re talking what, eight, nine-hundred years?”

”I- shut up.”

Ghazan turned back to his own noodles with a shrug. “You’re gonna have to tell her eventually.”

It was kind of hard to argue with that, so Korra just walked away ( _gracefully_ , no matter that Ghazan told her later she had obviously been pouting). Served him right to be stuck with the bill.  
  
  


_Ming-Hua_

“Why did you tell Asami that I wanted to talk to her?!”

Ming-Hua glanced up from her book to see Korra looming over her with her arms crossed, her clothing in bad disarray. “You did want to talk with her.”

“I never told you that!”

“But you always want to talk with her,” Ming-Hua pointed out. “I was just being informative.”

It took Korra a second to untangle her arms, which made the gesture of throwing her hands in the air less dramatic than she was probably going for. “Not while I’m in the shower!”

At that, Ming-Hua tried to look bashful for a moment before giving up on the act and shrugging with a pointed grin. “Eh. There are other things you could’ve been doing.”

Korra gaped. For a long moment, Ming-Hua thought there was a decent chance Korra would escalate the situation to a full-blown screaming match, but then the light in Korra’s eyes turned thoughtful. She still pointed a finger at Ming-Hua and said, “Don’t think I’ve forgotten this,” but she didn’t sound terribly dedicated to the implied revenge scheme and immediately walked off afterwards, still looking like she was planning something that had nothing to do with Ming-Hua at all.

 _I am so getting a gift basket out of this_ , Ming-Hua thought smugly, then turned back to her book.

 

_Zaheer_

“How did you choose when to tell P’Li you loved her? How did you know it was the right time?”

“I didn’t.”

“So you’re saying I should just dive into telling Asami about how I feel about her? No planning, no forethought, just do it?”

Zaheer blinked at her, pausing momentarily in his examination of the changing colors of Xai Bau’s sunset maple. “You’re in love with Miss Sato?”

Korra felt she was more successfully making her point this time when she threw her hands in the air. “Yes! For the past five months!” When Zaheer still looked confused in that way only Zaheer could–like he was just patiently waiting to be told of some vital piece of information that he was sure had just been omitted by mistake–Korra started to feel a little stupid and lowered her arms back to her sides. “P’Li… didn’t tell you?”

“P’Li would not share something with me you had told her in confidence.”

That sounded like P’Li. She was the least gossip-prone person Korra had ever met, so it made sense that- wait a second. “Then how did Ghazan and Ming-Hua know?!”

“It is likely one of them noticed independently and told the other.”

“Like… they did when you and P’Li were dancing around each other? Did they push you to tell P’Li you were in love with her?”

Zaheer went back to examining the maple. “I believe you are assuming far more parallels between our situations than actually exist.”

Korra was tempted to throw her hands up in the air again. It was hard to think of another gesture that properly expressed her frustration. “Well, I can’t ask my parents: my dad went through a formal courting process with my mom. Besides, what’s the big difference? You were both still in your teens, you had known each other for a while-”

“I spent the year before I confessed my love to P’Li completely alienating her due to my own stupidity. I had not had a real conversation with her in nine months. I had not seen her in six. I had no reason at all to think she would return my feelings; I told her of mine out of exhaustion at denying them, not out of any hope she would reciprocate. The fact that she did was fortune beyond what I deserved.” Korra normally couldn’t read Zaheer’s voice at all, and he sounded even more disinterested than usual when he disclosed his past romantic fuck ups, but he actually seemed a little bit thoughtful when he continued with, “You haven’t pulled away from Miss Sato, from what I’ve noticed. On the contrary, you seem to have grown more intimate. I wonder what is stopping you?”

What _was_ stopping her? She had told Mako easily enough.

About her gigantic boner for him. Not that he was the moon to her sea, the sun to her flames. ‘Avatar Korra is a romantic coward’ wasn’t a label she’d _thought_ was appropriate, but, well… what if Asami said no?

 _What if she didn’t?_ “… I think I’ve got to go.”

“The golden thorn roses are in bloom right now.”

 

_Asami_

Asami liked the roses.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> From a comment from asexualgurulaghima on tumblr about wanting to see the various members of the Red Lotus play wingman for Korra. This isn't exactly that, just them fucking with her love life, and this isn't really Hybridization canon, but it fits better within this 'verse than anywhere else.

**Author's Note:**

> I take prompts on my tumblr (leftofrevolution) sometimes, and when I'm at school those are easier for me to deal with than the 10,000+ word stories/chapters I tend to write unprompted.


End file.
